association football

noun

"association-football" is a 19-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“association football” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
20
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A ball game played between two teams of eleven players, each attempting to win by scoring more goals than their opponent.

Key facts for association football
PropertyValue
Headwordassociation football
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters20
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “association football” sits in English frequency

association football falls outside the top-100,000 ranked English words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

association football is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A ball game played between two teams of eleven players, each attempting to win by scoring more goals than their opponent.".

association football has no tracked misspelling variants, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.

Etymologically, the entry records: From it being the form of football codified and promoted by the Football Association. The correct English form is association football, spelled A-S-S-O-C-I-A-T-I-O-N- -F-O-O-T-B-A-L-L.

Definition

  1. 1
    A ball game played between two teams of eleven players, each attempting to win by scoring more goals than their opponent.

Etymology

From it being the form of football codified and promoted by the Football Association.

This word in other languages

Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "association football"?
"association football" is spelled A-S-S-O-C-I-A-T-I-O-N- -F-O-O-T-B-A-L-L.
What does "association football" mean?
As a noun, "association football" means: A ball game played between two teams of eleven players, each attempting to win by scoring more goals than their opponent.
What is the origin of the word "association football"?
From it being the form of football codified and promoted by the Football Association. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Using “association football”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct English spelling is A-S-S-O-C-I-A-T-I-O-N- -F-O-O-T-B-A-L-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source

Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list